Building a PC (Gaming) for my brother's Christmas present.

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poundej

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May 2, 2015
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Hey Guys,

I'm building a 1080p, Gaming rig for my brother - this needs to be able to run current games at 1080p, 60fps, medium setting... So i'm not asking for too much.

All i'm stuck on, is what graphics card to buy.

Here is the system so far;

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/23s4zy

I was thinking about a R9 380.

I have £150 - £200 to spend on a graphics card.

What one should i buy?
 
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bliq

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hmmm, tough call- the performance benefit of running dual channel doesn't IMO outweigh the benefit of adding a 2nd 8GB stick later on a MB that only has 2 slots. But I guess some would also argue the other way.
 
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poundej

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I already have the RAM spare from an old system, its just one 8GB stick but It's just in the part list for reference.

Does the 960 come in 4GB? I'd rather him go green side (because I prefer Nvidia) but I thought it only came in 2GB? That's why I was going towards the 380
 
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lodders

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I built a PC for my daughter using this Aerocool QC-203 M ATX Case USB 3.0 Rubber Coated with Interior - Fascia Black
by AeroCool
Saves you £16
Don't recommend one stick of RAM with AMD, their memory access is already really slow.
Instead, stretch your budget to
2x4Gb Crucial BLS2CP4G3D1609DS1S00CEU Sport 8 GB Kit (4GBx2), Ballistix 240-pin DIMM, DDR3 PC3-12800 Memory Module for £31
Amazon is a great place to buy computer parts......
 
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poundej

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I didn't mean to make this the answer...

But the 960 4GB cant be that price? That can't be right? Thats £100+ than a 970 :/
 
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SPgamer007

SPgamer007

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Don't go with the r9 380,as you have cx 500,while it is enough,it's not recommended for a r9 380.
A gtx 960 consumes less power than r9 380,hence should be a no problem,for your PSU.

Consider this thread,a fellow has stated the same thing to a very similer question.
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2689851/380-corsair-cx500-500w.html

You don't have to worry about VRAM of gpu,a 2gb vram uses almost 96% of the card,while you can see how good gtx 960 performs for yourself in high end games.Moreover,you'd need more than 2 gb of vram when you are going to play on everything ultra at 1080p in HEAVY games,which is not possible for a gtx 960 or r9 390.While playing normal games at ultra won't go over 2gb VRAM, don't have to worry about VRAM at all,in your case.

 
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SPgamer007

SPgamer007

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A 4gb gtx 960 is basically the 2gb gtx 960 with just extra vram to attract attention i'd say,going with the 4gb would be a complete waste,as a 2gb vram uses 96% of a gtx 960,4gb does the same,nothing extra,so no difference in performance,ups and downs in frames or anything like that.
Go with the 2gb.
 
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bliq

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I think more VRAM allows you to store more textures in RAM, it's not necessarily a fixed utilization just like system RAM. I think it's also resolution and setting dependent. then again, with a 960 should should be playing at 1080p or less so 2GB would probably still be fine in most cases.

also, not sure what you're seeing but that GTX960 is $209.99. The cheapest GTX970s here in the US are around $290
 
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geofelt

geofelt

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Be nice to your brother.

Read this comparison with a G3258.
http://www.techspot.com/review/1017-best-budget-gaming-cpu/

On your build, 8gb is good, but you want a 2 x 4gb ram kit so you can run in a faster dual channel mode.

A 5400 laptop drive is an awful performance choice.
Laptop drives are optimized for power savings, not performance.

Buy a 240gb ssd period... If you need more storage later, then adding a cheap drive will be ok.

Corsair CX does not have a stellar quality recommendation, but I think on a budget they are ok.
What is not ok is the 500w intended to power a R9 card like the 380.
Here is a chart to help:
http://www.realhardtechx.com/index_archivos/Page362.htm
Look for a quality psu like xfx or Seasonic.
Here is a quality list:
https://community.newegg.com/eggxpert/computer_hardware/f/135081/t/45344.aspx?Redirected=true

The nvidia Maxwell cards run more efficiently; I think a GTX960 would be appropriate, and would only require a 450w psu.

 
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geofelt

geofelt

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VRAM has become a marketing issue.
My understanding is that vram is more of a performance issue than a functional issue.
A game needs to have most of the data in vram that it uses most of the time.
Somewhat like real ram.
If a game needs something not in vram, it needs to get it across the pcie boundary
hopefully from real ram and hopefully not from a hard drive.
It is not informative to know to what level the available vram is filled.
Possibly much of what is there is not needed.
What is not known is the rate of vram exchange.
Vram is managed by the Graphics card driver, so there may be differences in effectiveness between amd and nvidia cards.
Here is an older performance test comparing 2gb with 4gb vram.
http://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/Video-Card-Performance-2GB-vs-4GB-Memory-154/
Spoiler... not a significant difference.
And... no game maker wants to limit their market by
requiring huge amounts of vram. The vram you see will be appropriate to the particular card.
 
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SPgamer007

SPgamer007

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More VRAM is always better,but in a card like gtx 960 where the 2gb uses all of it,what extra 2gb vram has of it to use? Total waste,as i mentioned.

 
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